Just about everyone receives physical mail, as opposed to electronic mail, either at their home or at a designated post office box. The traditional mailbox sits near the owner's home where it is filled by the mail person and emptied by the owner at the owner's leisure. However, many people live in communities or apartments that require the mail to be delivered to a central location. Others choose to have their mail delivered to a post office box.
A great number of communities have installed these centrally located mail boxes a distance from homes. Thus requiring the owners to make a special trip, often times in a car, to the mail box to retrieve mail. With this design, there is no convenient way to determine if there is any mail in a given mailbox. In addition, some of these systems are sent up with separate large boxes for holding large parcels. The mailbox owner is given a key to open the large box and retrieve their parcel.
When mail is delivered to one of these boxes, it is impossible for the owner of the box to know whether there is mail in the box. In addition, if a large package is expected, there is no way of knowing when the package is actually in a designated box. Therefore, there is a need for a means to notify a mailbox owner, remotely, of the presence of mail in the owner's box.